


don't break the bottle

by Ro29



Series: Messing around in the Soft Wars Sandbox [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Dred Priest is his own warning, Gen, He gets some nice comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Miscommunication, Neyo needs a hug, Protective CC-2224 | Cody, a little bit of, and then Cody figures it out, as a treat, but nothing is brought up in detail, he's doing his best, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:07:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26608753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ro29/pseuds/Ro29
Summary: Getting Neyo's pledge is difficult in a way Cody did not expect.(Priest has left his scars deep. Cody does his best.)
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody & CC-8826 | Neyo
Series: Messing around in the Soft Wars Sandbox [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1937752
Comments: 20
Kudos: 205
Collections: Open Source Soft Wars





	don't break the bottle

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SailorSol](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SailorSol/gifts), [Project0506](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Project0506/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Burgeoning](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23869885) by [Project0506](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Project0506/pseuds/Project0506). 



> This is all Sol's fault, she dropped this idea on me, enabled me and then tossed me more ideas. Thanks Projie for letting me mess around in your sandbox.
> 
> title is from 'safe ship, harbored' by the crane wives 
> 
> No real warnings other than Neyo's view of himself is a bit fucked up.

If Fox is the one who takes the longest to pledge to Kote, then Neyo is perhaps the one that takes _Kote_ the longest to understand just _what_ Neyo is expecting when he is asked to pledge.

Cody has been waiting for Neyo to be on leave at the same time as the 212th, he has a vague idea as to how this might go, if only from when he had gotten the rest of Edee’s pledges. Fox at this point, is still holding out, but Cody has never needed to be taught something twice.

He goes to Neyo himself to ask him for his pledge.

Cody doesn't know if it's because Neyo was— _is_ —Edee. Or if it's because he has always been too similar to Fox, for all that it would be impossible now—with Neyo's tattoo and the difference in their builds that came from being trained for different things—for them to be confused for each other like they used to be. But getting Neyo to actually _listen_ to him is more than half the trouble.

They sit and they go back and forth with their words. Neyo twisting the conversation away with jabs sharp and aimed like knives, and Cody maneuvering them back on track over and over until eventually, _eventually_ , when they are both tired and a little vicious, Neyo stops dancing around the question and Cody sits, steady and firm and asks.

It does not go well, in any sense of the word.

"If I pledge to you, _Alor_ " Neyo says, grin wide and just this side of mocking, "What do I get out of it? What do I get to be in this world of yours?"

Kote, who is _vod'alor_ and wants to protect every one of his brothers, has heard some version of this question from brothers who do not know him as well as the Shebs do. He's had different answers for all of them, but all with the similar thread of _'Home, safety, a chance for something better, a chance for choice.'_

He gives Neyo that same answer, the one that has brought squads to heel and had other's pledge to him.

Neyo does not pledge to him that day, leaves Kote with a blank smile, expression shaded just the slightest bit with something dark. Kote does not understand, continues to not understand.

He turns it over in his head, thinks over it as he maneuvers things into place, prepares and plans in between fighting a war and keeping his Jedi and brothers alive. Keeping his people safe as best as he can while they fight a war none of them had a choice in fighting.

He doesn’t come to a solution, can’t find the piece he’s missing.

Neyo is a puzzle Cody can’t crack.

(The answer comes to him when Ponds is talking to Cody one day.

“Edee men,” Ponds smiles, wicked glee on his face, “Leave worlds in the things they don’t say, and even more in what they _do.”_

Ponds hums, cackles at something on his comm, types something in reply with quick fingers before looking up at Cody with something knowing, “The trouble, is figuring out what those words _are_ , and what they mean.”)

It’s a long time after that before Cody gets the chance to speak to Neyo again, he has had plenty of time to think and analyze and plan.

The second time Kote asks Neyo to pledge to him, he listens to what's left unsaid just as much as what _is_ said.

Neyo is loose-limbed and sprawled in the chair, eyes half-lidded as he gazes at where Kote leans against the wall. Everything about him reads as unthreatening, Kote is not fooled, knows there is danger laced in every relaxed muscle.

"If I pledge to you _Alor_ ," Neyo begins again, a mirror of the first time they did this, "What will I get to be?"

And Cody might not bear the blame for not realizing what Neyo had meant the first time. But he will take it for every thought he has ever had, about Neyo and dangerous weapons strung together until they were not a sentence but a descriptor for this brother Cody half remembers as all of the best parts of Edee cobbled together into one.

There is rage there, burning bright from the realization of how Neyo sees himself—of just what Neyo is giving, expects to have to give, if he pledges—that Kote can not afford to lash out with, not now.

(He has never wanted to hurt Priest more.)

"You're not a weapon to be used, Neyo."

Neyo gives Kote a single raised eyebrow, "That is _everything_ I was made to be, so I ask you again, _Alor,_ " He spits the title out, prickly and mocking and contrary to the way he's gripping the arm of the chair tight enough that it must hurt, "If I pledge to you, what will you decide to use me for?"

Kote locks eyes with Neyo, doesn't look away as he breathes out, loud in the sudden silence of the room, "Nothing."

Kote will not give Neyo more reason to see himself as a monster shaped into a weapon.

Priest has done more than enough of that

Kote crosses the room, leans down, slowly, into Keldabe. Brings his hands up, gentle and careful to hold Neyo there.

Neyo exhales, Kote doesn’t think he’s even aware that he’s trembling.

“What,” Neyo starts, swallows, tries to claw back to that vicious indifference and falls short, “would you have me swear, _Alor_ , for my pledge. What would you ask of me.”

“I ask,” Kote—Cody, _glory_ , Commander, _vod_ , Shebs—says, “only what you are willing to give.”

Neyo swallows, searches for something that Kote isn’t sure he finds, “I am willing to be whatever I need to.” he says, careful, blank.

_I am willing to be whatever monster you need me to be to keep my brothers safe,_ Kote hears. _I will be whatever weapon you need to keep them from the same fate_ he reads, or thinks he does, between everything Neyo doesn’t say.

(Neyo and Edee are everything that the Shebs feared becoming. Kote is viciously, selfishly, glad they never had to bear it. He is furious Edee had to at all.)

“You are not something awful,” Kote starts, tries to drill into Neyo’s head even as he knows this will not be enough to combat years of the opposite being ingrained into Neyo’s bones. “I ask you for your pledge” Kote says, voice even, firm, even as his hands remain gentle, “because I would take all of the _vode_. I ask you for your pledge so I can take your burdens as mine, your victories as something I can revel in.”

Neyo’s face is still that awful blank slate.

“I would take you,” Kote says, “But I do not demand you pay me back by ripping yourself apart being something you are not, something you think you are.”

There is something wild in Neyo’s eyes, something scared and vulnerable.

When Neyo pushes Cody away, he lets him.

He does not get Neyo’s pledge that night.

It is later, after Baccara has pledged, before Fox has, that Neyo comes to him.

The third time Neyo and Kote stand with the word pledge heavy between them, Neyo does not fold, does not tremble, does not ask Kote what his use would be.

The third time, Kote walks away with a pledge and the weight of Neyo’s burdens on his shoulders.

(“No one,” he swears to Neyo, “will use you as a weapon, no one will turn you into a leashed monster. You are _mine_ and I will fight to keep you.”

_It is_ , he thinks as Neyo grins, feral and vicious and vulnerable in a way he’s trying desperately to hide, _the least he can promise_.)

**Author's Note:**

> I have...all the Edee feels rn
> 
> If you want to find me other places I have a [writing tumblr](https://rose-blooms-red.tumblr.com) and a [fandom tumblr](https://themessofthecentury.tumblr.com)
> 
> Please come yell at me about Star Wars and DC


End file.
